So far so good.
Helgi’s bellow had me swerving toward her, Jezebel already arcing in a swipe to cut the fucker off her back. She scrambled but didn’t lose her balance, and we cut a corner onto the main road leading to the industrial estate. Behind us the air was ripped by angry shrieks, and a quick glance over my shoulder showed that the spider things had halted pursuit.
What the heck?
“Don’t stop,” Helgi ordered. “Keep moving.”
The buildings changed, large factory-type structures made to house equipment and people. Lots of people. But then the structures thinned out, leading to open land and huge metal towers. Massive funnel-like structures rose up into the air in the distance. This was it. We were here. Low, flat buildings came into view—part of the plant, no doubt. We slammed through the entrance and then stood with our backs against the door.
“We made it,” Helgi said. “Now what?”
“Those funnel things outside should be producing steam or some kind of gas but they aren’t, which makes me wonder what is actually producing the heat to work these rotating thingies that produce the electricity.”
Helgi stared at me blankly.
I shrugged. “Look, it doesn’t matter. What matters is getting to the generators. If we shut those off, then no electricity will be produced.”
“And how long before the power lines are inactive?”
“I’m not sure. Not long. We need to find some kind of control room.”
“And where would a control room be?”
“There has to be a map of the facility somewhere. Let’s take a look.”
A long desk spanned the back of the foyer. This was where people came and checked in. There had to be something there, right?
“Where do you think everyone went?” Helgi asked in a hushed tone.
“Best not to think about that.” But the thought had crossed my mind.
All this perfectly preserved stuff and not a single perfectly preserved person. Had they gotten out, or had the monsters consumed them? Helgi shuddered and then vaulted over the metal barrier separating us from the rest of the facility.
“Anything?”
She grabbed a folder off the desk and flicked through it. “I think this is what you’re looking for.” She threw the folder at me.
The map of the facility was color-coded and clearly marked. Floor plans and levels and loads of gobbledegook greeted me. Control room...Where the heck was the control room. Aha. Page ten showed a floor plan of level two, the control room marked clearly at the center.
“Here.” I tapped the map. “We need to get to this control room. We can flip the relevant switch remotely from there.”
I hopped over the barrier and joined Helgi. “There’s a corridor through that door that connects the main building. We take the stairwell to level two and find the control room.”
“Let’s get it done.” Helgi headed for the door.
The next five minutes were uneventful. We took the stairs to the second floor and exited onto a dark corridor. The air smelled funky—a scent I couldn’t quite define. My scalp prickled.
“Anya…”
“Yeah, I feel it.”
“Fucking hell, what more can there be?”
I didn’t want to find out. “Let’s just get the job done and get out.” Left, we needed to go left. “This way. Three doors do—”
The thud of feet had my head whipping round. I caught sight of the creature a moment before Helgi did. A three-foot-high, red-eyed feral rat. My heart jumped into my mouth. I shoved Helgi back through the stairwell door and slammed it shut. The world vibrated as the thing ran past, and then there was silence.
Helgi’s chest heaved. “Please tell me that wasn’t what I think it was.”
“Fine, I won’t.”
“No. Uh-uh. No.” Helgi shook her head.
Rats and Helgi didn’t mix. The tank could flatten a Skin twice her size, could fight a wyvern and live, but when it came to rodents, she was a mass of nerves.
“It’s gonna be okay. It’s just the one. We can do this.”
“Just one?” She gave me an incredulous look. “Did you see the size of that bastard? No, Anya, I really can’t.”
She was hyperventilating.
Fuck. “Let me do it. You stay here.”
She bristled. “Like fuck.”
Oops, I’d prodded her pride. “Helgi, it’s okay. Trust me, if we come across a giant snake, it’s all yours.”
She squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head. “No, I have to do this. Like fuck am I going to cower. Never cower, remember?”
I locked gazes with her. “Yeah, I remember.”
I pulled Jezebel from her holster. “You ready to conquer your fear?”
“I’m ready.”
Her face was too pale, but I knew Helgi, and she was going to do this with or without me just to prove she could.
I pulled open the door and we stepped into the corridor.
No sign of the rat.
Helgi sagged. “Motherfucker.”
I strode ahead. “Let’s get to the control room before it comes back.”
I didn’t bother with the main lights. The huge room was filled with lit monitors and blinking lights. Everything was on and working, as if the humans who’d run this place had popped out for lunch and would be back at any moment.
It was creepy as fuck.
“Shitting hell.” Helgi studied all the tech. “Anya, chick, can you do this?”
I honestly didn’t know. “Look for a manual, anything that might have instructions.”
Helgi began to search while I studied the monitors. Images of the complex greeted me on the many screens—surveillance. Empty. Dark. Empty. Movement. Okay, level four was off bounds.
“Here.” Helgi slammed a huge manual on the desk beside me.
“Fuck, okay.” I paged through it, checking the index and finding the section on generator monitoring. “Keep watch. I got this.”
Ten minutes later, I’d accessed the feed to the generator room and pulled up the controls to adjust the many generators. All I needed to do was remotely shut them down.
I hit the relevant keys. Nothing happened.
“Dammit.”
“What is it?” Helgi asked from the door.
“It won’t remotely shut down.”
“What do we do now?”
I thumbed through pages until I came to the one with the schematics of the generator room, sublevel 0. I tore out the page and shoved it into my pocket.
“We head to the generator room and manually shut it down.”
“What level?” Helgi asked.
“Sublevel 0.”
She locked gazes with me, and it didn’t take a genius to figure out what she was thinking.
Rats loved the underground.
Chapter Five
We took the stairwell to the ground floor and then continued down. The final stairwell was pitch-black, and the smell I’d picked up on earlier was now a stench.
“We get in and we get out,” Helgi said for the third time.
Rats, why the fuck did it have to be rats? Huge cockroaches we could have handled, but rats? Fate was playing with us.